How to Move Unity Launcher to Bottom of Desktop in Ubuntu 16.04

Ubuntu 16.04 has been officially released by Canonical, and among several other features it also brings a couple of improvements that will definitely make users happy. Firstly, Unity Dash no longer shows online results by default, so there is no need to explicitly turn the feature off to make the search experience faster. And secondly, now you can actually move the Unity launcher from its default “left” position.

While that’s certainly good news, it’s worth pointing out that the ability to move the launcher is restricted – aside from the default “left” position, you can only move the launcher to the bottom. You still can’t put it on the right or at the top. But then again, it’s better than having no option at all. In this article we will discuss how you can access this new feature.

Ways to move the launcher

You can customize the position of your launcher in three different ways. Let’s discuss them one by one.

1. Using Unity Tweak Tool

If you’ve freshly downloaded Ubuntu 16.04, you’ll first have to download this tool, something which you can do by heading to Ubuntu Software (the new software center application) and searching for the tool by its name.

Once installed, open the Unity Tweak Tool.

Here, click the icon named “Launcher’ (the first icon in the ‘Unity’ row). The following window should open.

In this window select the “Bottom” radio button under the “Appearance” section. The moment you select that option, the Unity launcher will shift to the bottom of your computer screen.

2. Using Dconf-Editor

Another option is to use the “dconf Editor” tool. Like the Unity Tweak Tool, the dconf Editor tool can also be downloaded from the Ubuntu Software application.

Once downloaded and installed, open the app and head to the “com.canonical.Unity.Launcher” schema.

Click the “launcher-position” field and change its value from “left” to “bottom.” The moment you do this your launcher will be moved to the bottom of your screen.

3. Through command line

This is probably the easiest way and doesn’t require you to install any application. Simply open the terminal and type the following command:

gsettings set com.canonical.Unity.Launcher launcher-position Bottom

To pull it back to its default position, run the following command:

gsettings set com.canonical.Unity.Launcher launcher-position Left

Conclusion

Contrary to what many would think, changing the position of the Unity launcher through the command line is the easiest of all the ways mentioned above – you don’t have to download any separate software, plus the command is easy to remember as well.

As for the feature, it’s definitely a step in the right direction from Canonical, and we expect the company to also add the capability to move the launcher to the right and on the top in the upcoming Ubuntu releases.

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3 comments

ChiefHsays

After years of moving the bottom panel to the left side and the top panel to the right side to make more vertical screen area in a WIDE screen display, we now can put the Unity Launcher back down to take up viewing vertical viewing area. That seems to be a regressive idea. For years I was moving the top panel to the right and the bottom panel to the right, both in Ubuntu and Win7. just to better utilize my WIDE screen display. My laptop display orientation is fixed relative to the keyboard, but my PC monitor can be turned so that the long side it vertical, so I guess then moving the Unity Launcher would make more sense than on a horizontal display. Even now I wish I could move the top panel to the right side of the display.

Thanks for the information. I’ll use it on my Raspberry π-3 on which I installed Ubuntu Mate. For my PCs I prefer Linux Mint with cinnamon desktop or the KDE desktop (on mint or ubuntu, i.e. kubuntu — it doesn’t make much difference), which don’t have unity’s problems and are much more configurable, responsive and more attractive, besides being based on ubuntu.